Shriek: An Afterword

That surprised them, but Mortar nodded and said, “That only seems fair.”

The main appeal of Nativism to Ambergrisians was that it freed them from any responsibility to think about or do anything about the gray caps, while reassuring them that this was the most responsible thing they could do. And, in my opinion—I can already hear the howls of outrage, but I am unmoved—it absolved Ambergrisians from any guilt over the massacre perpetrated by Manzikert I.

“Not to mention that it saved them from having to worry about another Silence,” Duncan said. M & P had disappeared from view. The square below was relatively quiet.

“Not to mention,” I said.

Perhaps the speed with which House Hoegbotton and House Frankwrithe & Lewden embraced Nativism proves Duncan’s theory. What better way for the gray caps to protect themselves than by convincing the Houses? {I think this enters the far reaches of that land known as the Paranoid Conspiracy Theory, Janice.} Meanwhile, those of us not as devoted to blind ideology have had to suffer through the Nativists’ huge rallies, their righteous speeches, their letter-writing campaigns when anything the least bit threatening to their worldview has the audacity to step out into the light. I would imagine that even Sabon never realized that Nativism would become so popular, or that it would drive her book sales for so long. {Although, you must admit, the mechanics of the Shift have put a stop to her momentum.}

I had personal reasons for rejecting Sabon’s theory. Sometimes, during my tours of duty, I would see Sybel standing in the nearest available tree behind some mob listening to a Nativist speaker. He’d look back at me and shake his head, sadness in his eyes. After all, he’d been killed by a very specific deployment of the gray caps’ weapons. I’d lost a foot. It was hard to blame either outcome, ultimately, on the random, the unexplainable. At least, I refused to do so.

“But how can we pass on a message from you?” Pestle asked.

“Easy,” I said. “It’s for Mary Sabon. She is, after all, the leader of you Nativist types.”

Mortar had already begun shaking his head, about to protest that they didn’t know Mary, that they’d only read her books, but I waved these objections aside, pulled them both close.

Before the war, before Sybel’s death, before I became a gallery owner, this is what I would have said to them, either in a whisper or a roar: “First, let me point out that if you don’t deliver this message for me, I will have Duncan bring the gray caps down upon you like a plague so you can see for yourself just how motivated they are. So I suggest that as soon as I stop talking, you start searching for Sabon. I want you to tell Mary to stop misleading sycophantic morons like yourselves. To stop making it seem like everything in our lives is under our control, to stop undermining everything my brother has ever worked toward. To stop killing him by degrees, in public. To stop wasting your time and his time with these ridiculous theories of hers that only apply to her personal demons. To stop to stop to stop to stop to stop.”

But I didn’t say that. I was Janice Shriek, former society figure, and I’ll be damned if I let any two-bit tourists just off the slow boat from Stockton get under my skin.

What drove Mary to the cruelty of showing her “affection” for Duncan as mentor by tearing down all he had built up—and doing so after he had already become comfortable as a ghost—I do not know. Perhaps it was not just fear. Perhaps it was out of envy. Perhaps it was to show she could do it all better.

The practical effect of Sabon’s resurrection of discussions initiated by Duncan was that Frankwrithe & Lewden bought the rights to his books from Hoegbotton & Sons and proceeded to publish them in a badly edited, hideously expensive, horribly abridged omnibus entitled Cinsorium & Other Historical Fables {Dad would have punned it as Sin-sore-ium & Other Hysterical Foibles}, an edition intended solely for the library market so that scholars could peruse it as part of their primary text exploration of Sabon’s books. The rights Duncan had sold to Hoegbotton were all-encompassing and he could do nothing but accept a trickle of royalties from publication of the omnibus. He could not stop the butchery of his original texts. {Nor could I afford to object anyway, my income having dropped off precipitously since AFTOIS could not sustain me by itself.}

The omnibus received scant attention from reviewers—it was considered a historical curiosity, reflecting the “hysteria and ignorance of a less enlightened time,” as one of the few notices put it—meaning that kind readers like Mortar and Pestle only encountered Shriek through Sabon’s filter. One hates to think of Duncan struggling to express himself while F&L and his beloved Mary struggle to snuff him out, but that’s exactly what was happening.

Despite Sirin’s assertions from time to time—rebutted by Lacond at many a furious AFTOIS meeting, where according to Duncan, the issue came up continually—that Sabon meant no harm by her actions—perhaps even the opposite—and that neither did Hoegbotton in selling the rights to Frankwrithe & Lewden, I’m certain she resurrected him merely to more effectively destroy him. Whether she meant to or not. Nativism, as it turns out, was an excellent descriptor for Mary’s own actions.

What made me angriest, though, is that Duncan didn’t even seem to mind, as if accepting her right to take advantage of him. {I couldn’t hate her for it. And even as the sight of butchered chapters and paragraphs cut me to the quick, part of me thrilled to see any of my words back in print, in any form.}

No, what I said to Mortar and Pestle with sincerity and with hope, as I handed them my cheat sheets for the rest of the tour was simply, “If you do ever see Mary, tell her that Duncan sends his love.” It’s a pity I couldn’t maintain my composure later, on a certain marble staircase, but I’ve never claimed to be consistent.

Then I put my arms around Mortar and Pestle and turned all three of us to face the tour group.

“I’m afraid there’s been a change of plans. These two fine upstanding citizens from Stockton will be leading the rest of the tour. Enjoy!”

I left them without regret, Mortar and Pestle speechless, and climbed the steps to Duncan’s apartment overlooking Voss Bender Memorial Square, where we talked for quite some time, while below, through the open window, we witnessed the slow disintegration of the tour group.

The Ambergris Tourism Board—caught between their dead dog slogans and their sense of profit, between my protestations of being “confused” as to the message we were trying to convey and their certainty that I’d known exactly what I was doing—contemplated firing me, but couldn’t quite summon the nerve.